LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The United States' fifth hand transplant recipient now has a new right hand, thanks to a team of surgeons and the donor, a recently deceased Leesburg man.Zachary England, 27, died suddenly Nov. 22. England was an organ donor and, after he died, his hand was sent to the Louisville Jewish Hospital Hand Care Center where surgeons operated on amputee Jan "Erik" Hondusky, of Messina, New York.
Hondusky, a 43-year-old production worker, injured his right hand in a furnace accident April 12, 2006, when his hand was crushed and burned. His hand was amputated and he used a prosthetic hand to perform daily living activities until the Nov. 24 transplant.
According to a hospital press release, Hondusky's surgery went well and his body is responding well to the new hand.
England's mother, Mary England, said, though it is a difficult time for her, her husband Ron and the rest of their family, the transplant has been surprisingly comforting.
"It has comforted us just knowing that Zach is helping someone else get back to work providing for his family," she said. "At first, when they asked us about the hand, we just burst out crying. Finally, I just snapped out of it and I said 'We've got to do this.'"
Mary said she is also comforted because she knows that organ donation was very important to her son.
"When Zach renewed his license a year ago, it was very important to him to put that he was an organ donor on it," she said. "He actually came home and told the rest of the family to do it, too."
The Englands said they haven't had direct contact with Hondusky, but Mary said she wrote a four-page letter to him Thursday about her son's life. She sent him the letter through the transplant organization.
"I explained his life as best I could," she said.
In the letter to Hondusky, Mary wrote about the night her son died.
"I hope no mother has to go through what I did seeing our son lifeless with no brain function and having a machine breathing for him," she wrote. "As parents, we had to make the hardest decision on letting him go."
She also wrote about the lives her son touched.
"At his viewing at the funeral home, we had over 1,000 people come to pay their last respects," she wrote. "We did not know a third of them, but we heard such wonderful stories on how he had touched their lives. Classmates of his that my husband and I did not know came up to us and said Zachary would sit by them in class or the lunch room when no one else would. He always helped the underachievers."
According to a hospital press release, in an interview, Hondusky expressed his gratitude.
"Thanks to the donor family for their kindness at this sad time in their lives," he said.
Besides being only the fifth successful hand transplant operation in the U.S., Hondusky's transplant is also providing the opportunity for doctors to improve the way transplant patients are cared for. Immunosuppressive drugs are used to help transplant patients' bodies from rejecting new limbs and organs. However, the drugs also have harmful side effects, including a higher incidence of cancer, infections and other disorders. Transplant patients are usually treated with several immunosuppressive drugs, but doctors are attempting to help Hondusky's body adapt to the new hand using only one.
"We are monitoring him very closely for signs of rejection with weekly biopsies, other laboratory tests and evaluations as needed," said Dr. Kadiyala Ravindra, assistant professor of surgery at University of Louisville.
According to Hondusky's doctors, he will spend about three months in Louisville recovering and undergoing therapy. Then, if all goes well, Hondusky will be back to work, hugging his 2-year-old granddaughter with two hands and even riding his motorcycle. Mary said that's just what she's hoping for.
"Life is so hard for me without my son here in my life," she wrote in her letter to Hondusky, "but I have wonderful memories to help get me through each day and just knowing that he has helped so many people through his organ and hand donations is a comfort."
